


Not So Damsel In Distress

by Chrystie, kate882



Series: Disney's Hercules AU [1]
Category: Batman - All Media Types, DCU (Comics), Young Justice - All Media Types
Genre: Alternate Universe- Disney's Hercules, F/M, Hades!Jason, Hercules!Conner, M/M, Meg!Tim, and Phil!Wally, featuring:, such as including Persephone (Dick), we took some creative liberties though
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-03-10
Updated: 2019-03-10
Packaged: 2019-11-14 20:07:34
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 9,828
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18059204
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Chrystie/pseuds/Chrystie, https://archiveofourown.org/users/kate882/pseuds/kate882
Summary: “I’m gonna take it that your meeting with the river monster didn’t go over too well.” Jason didn’t sound the slightest bit shocked, he did sound annoyed though.“It was going fine until Superboy decided to show up and play hero. He’s got West following him around too,” Tim answered, rolling his eyes. “Never mind the fact that, according to you, that guy is retired.”





	Not So Damsel In Distress

Kon was born a god. The son of Clark, god of the sky, he was born with super strength, vision, hearing, heat vision (which caused a lot of trouble when the baby god would throw a tantrum), and really the list goes on and on depending on which myth you read.

And the majority of the gods were happy to have this new child among them. There were plenty of demigods of course, it’s a  well known fact among mortals that the gods have a bit of trouble keeping it in their pants, but not very many godly children graced Olympus.

There was one god, however, who was not pleased with this development. Jason, the god of the underworld, had long since grown disillusioned by the gods with their holier than thou attitudes, and being shunned because he resided over death.

A new god meant more to fight against him when his plans to overthrow Olympus came to pass.

Jason was especially unhappy about the new godling when he contacted the fates and learned that his plan to release the Titans on the gods would only work if Kon wasn’t to interfere.

So, he sent Roy and Kori to retrieve the child and make it mortal so that it could be killed.

It all went according to plan, except for one problem. Kon didn’t finish the potion that would turn him mortal, and while it got rid of almost all of his many, some might even suggest too many, powers, it left him with his super strength.

But Roy and Kori neglected to tell Jason this minor detail. Or that they hadn’t actually killed the child. And a pair of farmers found Kon.

They took him in, naming him Conner after seeing Kon on his necklace, and raised him as their son.

But Conner never could quite fit in with his super strength.

Eventually, with heavy hearts, his parents showed him the necklace they had found him with. A necklace with the S symbol that Clark wore on his chest.

And so started Conner’s journey to be a hero and find his way back to the gods.

* * *

“No.” Wally West, a demigod with Barry’s speed powers and retired hero trainer, slamming the door of his house in Conner’s face upon seeing the S symbol wasn’t a good start to his journey.

“What do you mean no? I haven’t said anything yet!” Conner shouted. He couldn’t bang on the door. He’d break it off its hinges.

The door opened again and Wally looked him up and down. “I mean no. I’m not training wannabe heroes anymore. Go home.” And then the door was closed again before he could even blink.

“But I was told to come here.” And there went his goal to not take the door off its hinges. He hadn’t even thought when he grabbed for the handle.

“And now you’ve been told to go home. After you fix my door.” Wally didn’t even look surprised by the damage to his home.

“But you’re my only hope. Clark said the only way back to him was to become a hero through you.”

“Oh well if _Clark_ said,” Wally rolled his eyes. “Fix my door, kid. Consider it control training if that’s what you need to get it done.”

“I mean, I can definitely do that, but that doesn’t sound like you actually agreeing.” Still though, Conner got to work reattaching the hinges.

“Because I’m not agreeing. I retired from the hero training gig. Which I’m pretty sure Clark knows.”

“Why? From what I could tell, Clark thinks you’re the best.”

“That’s because no one else wants the job of training heroes. It’s easy to be the best if you’re the only person doing the job.”

“So what I’m hearing you say is, you don’t think you’re good enough.”

Wally narrowed his eyes at him. “What you’re hearing me say is that I’m tired of of young kids showing up at my door so they can learn how to die painful deaths. Because that’s what half of you do. You leave, before you’re even finished training most of the time, because of some new threat of the week, and you take on something you’re not equipped to fight, or you sacrifice yourself for the greater good, or hell you abandon all principles and turn evil and either kill or get killed by another young wannabe hero. I’ve seen it all, and I’m tired of it.”

“But...” Conner scratched his chin, “Aren’t you doing your job exactly right if they die from saving people. That’s what a hero does, right? They save people despite the risks. The few abandoning their good principles does look pretty bad though.”

“Yeah, kid, a hero saves people,” Wally said with a sigh. “But if they live to save more people, they’re a better hero. And I’m not sending any more kids to their deaths. So if you want to go fight monsters or whatever, you can do that, but I’m not in the hero business anymore.”

“But what if I couldn’t die?” It had taken a while to figure it out, but along with Conner’s super strength, he was also pretty invulnerable. He’d learned this by running into a fire to save his dad and belatedly realized that the fire hadn’t hurt at all. Really, it just felt warm on his skin.

“Everyone can die. That cocky attitude is exactly what causes young heroes to throw themselves into danger they can’t handle.”

“I get where you’re coming from, but I’m serious. Just try swinging a sword at me or something.”

“Absolutely not.”

“I’m serious. I really can’t die.”

“That’s great. Listen, what’s your name, kid?”

“Conner, but Clark called me Kon.”

“Yeah, okay, listen Conner, you seem like a nice kid and all, so let me be very clear: I’m not about to attempt to murder you just because you don’t understand that even the gods can be killed if you have the right weapons.”

“Then teach me. Because as far as I’m concerned,” Conner reached for a vaguely rusty axe he saw lying by the door and swung it at his own arm, breaking the axe head clean off its handle, “I’m pretty invulnerable.”

“... so breaking my door wasn’t enough for you? Is this how you convince people to help you, you break their stuff until they agree?” Wally asked, rummaging around his drawer until he came up with a green dagger. “Catch this and tell me if you think you could handle being stabbed by it after holding it,” he said tossing it over.

“Sorry, I’ll replace it.” Conner caught the knife and immediately felt weak. “What-what is this?”

“Oh, Clark didn’t tell you about kryptonite?” He asked sarcastically “Typical.” Wally took it back from him and he almost immediately felt better. “Anyone can be killed. You go wearing that S around your neck and anyone with godly experiences knows how to kill you.”

“Look, I know it’s asking a lot of you, but I really just want to get the chance to get to know my biological parents, something that was somehow taken from me, and if I can help some people along the way there then it’s a bonus. I’m really not planning to die. Kinda the exact opposite really.”

“No one is planning to die when they become a hero. But then they see a big monster, or meet a pretty girl - or boy, whatever your preference- or they make some kind of trade off with their life. It’s exhausting to train people and care about them and watch them die. And no offense, but Clark is an asshole for telling you that you have to be a hero to get to him, not telling you about kryptonite, and sending you to me, who he knows doesn’t train heroes anymore.”

“I mean, yeah kinda when you put it that way, but I mean, what else can I do?”

Wally stared him down before he finally sighed. “I’m going to regret this. Fine. Fine, I’ll train you, but you owe me a door and an axe first.”

“The door’s mostly fixed.” He was lucky that Ma and Pa had him learn how to do all the handiwork around the farm. “I swear I’ll replace the axe.”

“You certainly will if you want my help,” Wally agreed. “Damn, Artemis is going to kill me for taking you on.”

“I swear I’ll be a good student? I’m a fast learner.”

“You think that’s going to stop my fiance from killing me? Or you if that door isn’t fixed.”

“It’s fixed! I just need a nail.”

“Well then run to town and get one. And then run back and get me an axe. You need to build up your muscle to handle all that strength you’ve got.”

That sounded pretty ridiculous to him, but he had asked to be trained. “Okay, I’ll be back soon then, I guess.” And he took off running towards the town.

* * *

“We’re actually practicing fighting today,” Wally announced after a solid month of having Conner just run and lift heavy things. Conner had been half convinced that Wally and Artemis were just using him to run errands for them, but Wally had super speed, it’d be much faster for him to just do it himself.

“Finally,” Conner sighed. While Wally had been right and he’d definitely built up a good amount of muscle, it had all felt very tedious.

Wally led him out in front of his house and then stood still in front of him. “Alright, come at me, kid. Show me what I’m working with.”

With a punch and a kick and another punch that Wally managed to completely avoid, he did not look impressed.

“Well you’re not even trying to hurt me. I could dodge those without super speed. You know that none of those are going to land, right? You’re holding back too much.”

“But if I actually hit you, I might actually hurt you.”

“You won’t actually hit me. When we get to that I’ll make sure you’ve got just enough kryptonite on you to make it not deadly for me to take a hit.” Wally zipped behind him before he could even blink and tapped his shoulder. “So for now, come at me with all that you have.”

“If you’re sure.” This time, Conner put a little more swing in his hits, tried to predict where Wally would be rather than where he was and he still couldn’t really hit him. He only managed to more or less land something when he figured to just hit the ground hard enough for it to split, and that didn’t even hit Wally it just made him stumble a bit, look faintly surprised and amused, and then go back to dodging.

At some point during this Artemis came outside to watch and occasionally called out tips to him, but by the end of it he was sweating and nearly ready to collapse and hadn’t hit Wally once. “Not the worst I’ve dealt with.” Wally decided.

“I really hope that’s true, because that felt terrible.” Although it was kind of refreshing to have someone see him swing his arms and not immediately be afraid of him.

“Of course it did. Super strength and invulnerability are great powers for fighting normally. I’m guessing you’ve never lost a fight before. But if you’re planning to be a hero, you’ll fight people and things those don’t work against. You’ve got to learn to be creative with your fighting in those situations. Like that ground punch you did.”

“Don’t feel bad; Wally does this to every wannabe hero with good offensive powers,” Artemis told him. “I’ve seen like four quit because of it.”

“I guess that makes me feel a little better. I definitely don’t plan to quit.”

“After the fuss you made to get me to teach you, I’d hope not.”

“Yeah, not quitting, but I’m just gonna-“ Conner flopped himself onto the ground with a groan.

“Yeah yeah, just know we’re doing this again tonight,” Wally said, heading inside with Artemis, leaving Conner on the ground.

“Right, got it.” Conner should probably eat before that or maybe sleep. Sleep was good too, and the patch of dirt he was on was pretty comfy. Yeah a nap sounded great.

* * *

“Take this, today I’m not going to use super speed which means you can’t use super strength,” Wally said, tossing him a small bit of green rock.

Conner instantly felt weaker, but it was so small it didn’t really hurt as much as when he’d had the full dagger. It was still pretty uncomfortable, but Wally was right, he didn’t want to actually hurt him so he put the rock in his pocket.

Wally still kicked his ass, and Conner had to take solace in the fact that Wally had been training heroes for years while he was just learning how to fight, but he was able to actually get a few hits in this time, so they were both bruised and tired by the end of their sparring. “You’re getting better.”

“I hope I am because it really doesn’t feel like it.”

“C’mon, rest up for an hour, get some water, and then we’re back to it.”

They went like that for the rest of the day. Conner still only managing to hit Wally a few times and get in a few creative hits. He could tell he was starting to get better as they went on, which was refreshing if nothing else, even if he was tired out of his mind.

* * *

It still took a while before he was finally allowed to do hero stuff. Supervised hero stuff, but hero stuff nonetheless.

Although he was starting to think evil just wasn’t happening that day, which would be just his luck, when Wally suddenly perked up, head turning towards a waterfall where a monster appeared to be attacking a young man around Conner’s age who… oh. Might actually be the prettiest boy he’d ever seen. And suddenly he understood what Wally had said about heroes going to their deaths for a pretty face, because without thinking he was already sprinting towards the scene to save the boy.

“Get your hands off him!” Conner announced his arrival, giving the monster a chance to stop before he kicked its butt.

“What the-” the boy looked at him, and the distraction gave the monster, some kind of giant centaur like creature, the chance to kick him, throwing him a few feet until he landed in the water with a loud splash.

“Hey!” That was enough incentive for Conner to pounce at the monster, punching it in the face and pulling it into a chokehold.

“What do you think you’re doing?” The boy, who appeared fine even after being kicked several feet away, got up dripping wet to glare at him.

“Uh, saving you?” He'd been more sure of that before that glare was directed at him.

“I don’t need saving, I can handle this myself.”

“Are-are you sure? Because I’m happy to help and he looked like he was giving you trouble. Aren’t you a young man in distress?”

“I’m in distress. I don’t need help,” the boy answered, and started to make his way over to them, but the monster managed to escape Conner’s choke hold and take off.

And then Wally was in front of him, a disapproving frown on his face. “Are you kidding me?” He asked flatly.

“I can admit that didn’t go too great; on the other hand though,” Conner turned back to the really pretty boy, “Are you sure you’re alright?”

“Hey, hey, stop right now with the heart eyes,” he could hear Wally saying, but he was already walking past him as the boy was wringing water out of his hair.

“Oh I’m great,” he said sarcastically, pushing the hair out of his face and looking Conner up and down. “So, did they give you a name to go with all that bulk, Superboy?”

“I just go by Conner, but Superboy... I like that. You’re sure you’re okay? He kicked you pretty hard.”

“I’m positive. I’m Tim,” he held out his hand, and Conner was about to reach for it when Wally jerked him back by the collar of his shirt.

“And we’re leaving,” Wally said firmly.

“But shouldn’t we make sure Tim gets home safe?”

“Tim seems like he can handle himself,” Wally said and Tim smirked a bit.

“I’ll be fine, Superboy. After all, I’m a pretty tough guy,” he said, flexing his much small arm while eyeing Conner’s biceps.

“But helping him home would be the gentlemanly thing to do, right? And heroes should also be gentlemen, right?” He could admit to himself that that smirk and those eyes did something to him.

“Don’t go pissing off your chaperone on my account. I’ll make it on my own. See you around, Conner.” Tim shot him an amused look and waved before he started walking off, and Wally grabbed his sleeve before he could walk after him.  

“I really hope I see him around,” Conner said more to himself than anyone else.

“What did I specifically tell you not to do when we first started training?”

“To not die?”

“Yes. To not die. And I think part of that lecture about not dying was to not go throwing yourself into danger because you see a pretty girl or boy. And what did you just do, on the very first outing I take you on?”

“He looked like he needed help,” Conner tried to defend himself but that was exactly what he’d done.

“He looked like he had big blue eyes and a nice ass, you mean. If it was about him needing help you would have given it a second’s thought and not caused him to get kicked into the river, where he could have drowned while you were fighting the monster if he’d fallen face first and hit his head.” And Conner had the decency to look ashamed at that.

“C’mon, that’s enough adventuring for today,” Wally muttered, starting back towards his house.

“I’ll be more careful next time.”

“Don’t tell me that. Show me.”

* * *

“I’m gonna take it that your meeting with the river monster didn’t go over too well.” Jason didn’t sound the slightest bit shocked, he did sound annoyed though.

“It was going fine until Superboy decided to show up and play hero. He’s got West following him around too,” Tim answered, rolling his eyes. “Never mind the fact that, according to you, that guy is retired.”

“Superboy? What is that, a new Achilles doll? And West is retired. Couldn’t handle the gig after I got his last kid.”

“Well he’s back apparently,” Tim shot Jason an accusing look, “with a new Clark adjacent hero. Kon or Conner or something like that. Who thought that I was a damsel in distress and came rushing to the rescue.”

“Wait wait wait, back up there. What did you say his name was?”

“Conner. I’m pretty sure it was Conner. He seems new since West is still following him around for heroing.”

“No, you said Kon. Tell me, does he have black hair, blue eyes and all around, looks a lot like Clark?”

“I said Kon or Conner, you know like half the name. I’m sure he said Conner though. But yes that’s what he looks like. Sorry, I didn’t think I needed to check the guy’s ID for you too.”

Jason took a deep breath in, which meant he was probably going to kill somebody. “Roy! Kori! Come here!”

“Hey Tim,” Roy said as he appeared at of thin air, Kori following behind him.

“Remember how eighteen years ago, I told the two of you to make Clark’s kid human and then kill it? Do you guys remember what you told me when you came back from that?”

“... that… we did that,” Kori answered.

“Did you though? Because I’m starting to hear something different. So tell me, did you actually kill the kid?”

“Tim, what the fuck,” Roy turned to him accusingly

“I was a _baby_ eighteen years ago. I don’t know your immortal bullshit secrets.”

Kori at least looked apologetic. “Kon was just a baby, Jay. We turned him human, but it seemed like overkill to kill him after that.”

“Well now he’s out there with West saving people and that’s a problem.”

“Wait what? No, Wally is retired and Kon is human,” Kori said, frowning at them.

“No, he’s definitely not human. He scared the river monster bad enough to send it running before West dragged him off,” Tim told her.

“You hear that?” Jason waved at them, “Apparently this _human_ teenager scared off the river monster!” Jason took another deep breath in, this time it actually looked like it was to try and calm down. “Look. I know he was a baby, but I can’t have this kid running around learning how to save people. The god damn fates said he’s the only thing that stops me from dethroning Clark and Bruce. So now what we’re going to do is put some focus into killing this guy too, got it?”

“Like I said, he seems new. Shouldn’t be hard,” Tim shrugged.

“You said that West dragged him off? If he was fighting well why’d West have to step in?”

“Oh, no, that was after the fight. I don’t think West liked that Conner was crushing on me,” Tim said dismissively.

“The kid’s into you? Well why didn’t you say so in the first place. Looks like little Timmy here _can_ get some. Too bad that’s how we’re now going to off Kon.”

Tim frowned. “I’m not getting involved like that.”

“Yes you are. That’s what selling your soul means.”

“I don’t even know what you’re expecting me to do. I talked to him for maybe two minutes. It’s not a deep connection.”

“I’m thinking about it. I don’t actually hate the kid, he’s just in my way. Maybe we’ll just use you as bait.”

“He’s trying to be a superhero. I don’t understand why that has to be me.”

“Oh young, naive Timberly. Something you’re going to learn very soon is that love and lust make everyone stupid.” Jason had that unnervingly confident smile on his face like he’d already killed Conner.

“Cut him a break, Jaybird. The kid’s only been alive eighteen years. He’s hardly seen romance,” Roy pointed out.

“I don’t believe in love at first sight,” Tim told him flatly.

“Don’t give me that look, Roy. I’m not going to have Tim fuck him and kill him. Tim’s just going to be the distraction to, I don’t know, a monster that’s going to eat him.”

“I don’t know, I think he’d be more vulnerable after sex,” Kori mused.

“And you’d be right,” Jason nodded, ”But again, I don’t actually hate the kid, and even I think that would be pretty cruel.”

“So I just… what? Ask him to follow me to a monster’s layer without his chaperone? Because that’s not suspicious,” Tim muttered.

“No of course not. I’m thinking we put you in some danger, what do you say, Timmy?” It wasn’t a question and they all knew it.

And because they all knew it, Tim just sighed and nodded. “What am I doing?”

* * *

This time when he saw Tim in trouble he took a minute before he jumped in to help him. He made sure to properly analyze what was happening, and then jumped in when he saw an opening, scooping Tim away first. “Fancy meeting you again.”

“Superboy, still playing hero?” Tim answered with amusement.

“Aiming more for professionally doing, but yeah, I guess you could say that. I can see you haven’t been staying out of trouble.”

“Me? Trouble? Never,” Tim grinned at him and Conner felt his heart stutter.

“I don’t know if I believe that considering our first two meetings.” As much as Conner wanted to just maybe stare at Tim, there was a monster terrorizing people. So with the slightest bit of regret, he put Tim down a safe distance away and jumped back towards the monster.

Which… didn’t die when he cut off it’s head. In fact, it grew two more and that was not ideal.

“Hydra, you can’t cut off it’s heads,” Wally called from where he was now standing near Tim watching.

“Then how exactly do I kill it?” Conner yelled as he dodged its attempts to eat him.

“Creatively. Like when you fight me,” Wally answered unhelpfully.

The next few minutes was just Conner desperately avoiding the two heads as he tried to figure a way to beat the hydra. It wasn’t until he noticed that he has the hydra cornered at a cliff side that he remembered the first time he managed to trip Wally up. He jumped up onto the cliff and punched the ground hard enough to break a large chunk off that fell and crushed the monster.

“That was great, kid!” Wally exclaimed suddenly at his side.

“I hope so. That was hard.” Conner was on his knees, panting heavily. “How’s Tim?”

“Tim is fine,” Wally said, rolling his eyes. “Let’s get you home and go over how we could improve this encounter. And magical monsters.”

“Okay,” he continued to pant, “just- just let me check up on him.” He ran over to Tim despite how tired he was before Wally could protest. “Hey, you okay?”

“Are _you?_ I’m not the one that just took down a monster,” Tim was staring at him with wide eyes, like he was actually surprised Conner had succeeded. Which, might be offensive if Tim hadn’t seen his last attempt at being a hero.

“Yeah, yeah. A little tired, but it didn’t really manage to get a hit on me.” He was glad that he’d done dodging and blocking with someone who was so much faster than him.

“I noticed that.” Tim looked like he might say something else, but glanced around at the crowd that had formed. “I think your new fans did too.”

“Wha-fans?” Sure enough the crowd looked pretty awed at what he just did, and while he was flattered and kind of wanted to bask in the attention, he’d told Wally he was just checking up on Tim. “Wow. I have fans. I should go though; I just wanted to make sure you were okay.”

“Alive and breathing,” Tim gestured to himself.

“And not a scratch on you,” Conner grinned. “I’ll see you around?”

“I certainly hope so.”

* * *

Almost as soon as Conner was out of sight Jason appeared next to him.

“So that didn’t work,” Tim said blandly.

“Wow thanks, Timmy, I hadn’t noticed,” Jason bit out. “I thought he was a rookie.”

“He’s a rookie being trained by Wally West, and who apparently was born a god.”

“Then maybe we should be trying to break them up,” Jason thought out loud.

“How would you even do that?”

“Well first you gotta go on a date. Go fish me some info, Timmy.”

“I thought I was just bait, since you apparently don’t hate him,” Tim said accusingly.

“I don’t, but using you as bait clearly didn’t work, and I still need him dead for my plans to work. So, you and your sassy little butt are going to go on a date with him and get info on how to split him and West apart. Or just how to kill him easier; whichever comes first.”

“No. I’m done with men and romance and all of that. I’m not going on a date with Conner for you. Find some other guy for him.”

And Jason just looked so done with him, rubbing a hand over his face exasperatedly. “You don’t have to like him. You just get him to like you more and tell you things.”

“Find someone else,” Tim repeated.

“Look. _Look_ Timmy. I know you had that whole thing with that sleeze ball who left you to be with some other idiot after you sold your soul for him. I know. I’m not asking you to get your heart broken again. I’m asking you to do recon.”

Tim frowned at him, but finally sighed. “It’s a stupid plan.

“It’s my only plan at the moment, so we’re going with it.”

* * *

Tim still thought this was a stupid plan when he did finally run into Conner again.

It had only been a few weeks, but Conner had been busy, fighting monsters and building up a following.

“Superboy, long time no see,” he called when he spotted him in town.

“Tim, hi.” Conner grinned at him, pretending he hadn’t stumbled just slightly trying to stop in front of him. “You know that name’s really caught on.”

“Yes, I’ve noticed. Someone tried to sell me a Superboy action figure on my way here. Should I be asking for credit?” Tim teased. “It wasn’t a very good figure though. Hardly looked like you; I’m not sure I want my name attached to that particular bit of merchandise.”

“Yeah, I didn’t exactly expect the fans and the merchandise when I went into this, but I can’t say I’m complaining.”

“Are you doing hero work today then? I’d hate to be keeping you from fighting monsters and signing autographs,” Tim said, leaning casually against one of the lamp posts and ignoring the eyes starting to be drawn to them.

“I actually just finished what I was doing. What are you up to? It’s different seeing you out of danger.”

Tim held up his shopping bag. “Buying lunch. But I think I got enough to share if you’re interested.”

“Share? Yeah-yes I’d like that.”

Tim smiled at him. “Yeah? Great, c’mon, I know some gardens near by where we might not have as much of an audience,” he said, pushing off of the post and starting to walk, not checking that Conner was following him.

“A convenient lunch by a convenient garden. If I didn’t know any better I’d say this was planned,” Conner laughed. He was joking, but that didn’t mean it didn’t give Tim even more second thoughts.

“Well… I have been hoping I’d run into you. And I have noticed your fans. So I may have looked for a place we could have some privacy if we met up again,” Tim told him, “but lunch, those food stands always give me too much. That just happened to work out or I’d have offered to get you your own.”

Conner’s face practically lit up at the fact that Tim had been trying to see him. It made Tim feel terrible. “Well, planned or not, I could never say no to you.”

“You hardly know me,” Tim pointed out, even if it was an ill advised thing to say.

“But I want to get to know you,” He said simply.

Tim really wished that Conner was less nice. It would make this whole thing feel better. They reached the gardens and Tim lead them over to a bench in front of a fountain. “Gyro?” He asked, holding the bag out towards Conner.

“Thanks.”

Conner was surprisingly open about himself. He was happy to tell Tim about how he grew up, how he figured out that Clark was his dad, and how becoming a hero tied into all of that. He did ask Tim a bit about himself too, which Tim was less inclined to answer, and despite wanting to get to know Tim, he was really respectful of his boundaries.

He was so nice. Too nice, actually. Tim could feel himself starting to relax around him, and he really shouldn’t be doing that with the guy he was supposed to be fishing info from. “What about you and Wally?” Tim asked, even as he felt guilt coil in his stomach. “I thought he retired. How does he factor into you being a hero?”

“Yeah, he wasn’t too thrilled about me asking him to step out of retirement. He seems to have a lot of guilt on his shoulders from his past trainees. I don’t know how, but I did manage to convince him to give me a chance.”

“Guilt? Why, he seems like a good teacher if you’re anything to judge by.”

“He doesn’t talk too much about it, but he’s lost a good number of trainees. First thing he showed me was that I’m not as invulnerable as I thought I was.”

“You seem pretty invulnerable to me,” Tim only lightly punched his arm and still had to shake out his hand a bit. “Yeah, definitely feels invulnerable. Ow.”

“There’s some type of material or something both me and Clark are apparently weak to. I don’t really remember what it’s called.”

“Kryptonite.” Jason would already know that one. It wasn’t particularly useful information past noting that Conner had inherited that weakness.

“Yeah, that was it. Wally gave me some when we were training just to weaken me a bit so I wouldn’t seriously hurt him.”

“It’s also a good practice to be able to fight without your powers if someone else has any kryptonite,” Tim mused out loud. He was sure Wally had been thinking the same thing when he’d decided to do that training.

“Huh, I guess I never really thought of it like that. I’ve kind of accepted that Wally’s always going to be a few steps ahead of me.”

“He has been training heroes for a while now,” Tim pointed out consolingly.

“Yeah, but we’ve only been talking about me. What about you? What have you been up to?”

“Other than getting into trouble?” Tim teased, and he wished he wasn’t aware that his smile was starting to feel more genuine. “Reading, wandering the town. It’s been pretty boring, except I did just land this nice date in the gardens with a superhero, so that’s a bit different.”

Conners face grew faintly red. “Oh well, yeah, I guess the date is a pretty nice change from what I usually do too. Especially with someone so beautiful and smart and I guess just all around amazing.”

Okay now Tim was blushing too. If he thought it was possible to kill the god of the dead Jason would be dead. And oh gods they were leaning in. When had Tim’s eyes closed? So much for being smart, this was so stupid.

Their lips touched and Tim barely got the chance to enjoy it before they were in the air and Tim felt his stomach drop in a completely different way. “Conner! Conner, what are you doing?!” He held on tighter after making the mistake of looking down, hiding his face against Conner’s chest so he wouldn’t do that again.

“Hmm?” Conner glanced down and seemed just as surprised as Tim was that they were in the air. “Am I flying? Oh my gods, I’m flying!”

“You haven’t done this before?” That was not reassuring at all. Tim wasn’t sure if he could hold onto Conner any tighter, but he was trying his best.

“No, I didn’t know I could do this.” Conner wrapped his arms around Tim just slightly more securely, careful of his grip so he wouldn’t hurt him,

“Do you know how to get down?” Tim mumbled into Conner’s chest.

“Uh,” Conner looked to ground and he didn’t sound too sure of himself. “Are you scared of heights?”

“I’m not _scared,”_ he didn’t even sound convincing to himself. “I just have a healthy amount of caution regarding falling, especially since this is new territory for you and I’m not invulnerable.”

“I’d never hurt you.” Conner looked down to the ground and back to Tim. “Trust me?”

Tim slowly peeked up from Conner’s chest to look at his eyes, and he found himself answering without a lot of thought, not something he was used to doing. Especially when it came to trust. “Yes,” he said softly.

“Okay, then just hold on.” Conner held a hand to Tim’s head, getting him to tuck his face into his chest again and slowly he felt them tilt over. Conner was flying towards the ground, he was doing it pretty slowly, but it was still flying straight to what would hurt if he didn’t stop in time. Before he knew it, they were up right again and Conner was smiling down at him. “I’m not really sure how to be completely on the ground, but at least we’re closer to it.” Sure enough, they were only hovering a few inches off the ground.

Tim climbed out of his arms, dropping the few inches, and then reached up and linked their hands, tugging Conner down until his feet touched the ground too, offering Conner a tentative, if not slightly shaken still, smile.

“I guess that’s something I’ll need to start practicing.” Conner smiled sheepishly.

“Yes, that along with not disappearing with no warning,” Wally’s voice interrupted them, and both of their heads snapped over to his disapproving face.

“It’s my fault. I asked him to come out with me,” Tim instantly piped up.

“Yes, I’m sure you did,” Wally muttered, “But you're not my responsibility; he still should have known better.”

“It was just a short lunch break. I wasn’t gone that long.”

“Conner, you might not have realized yet that you’re a well known hero now, but other people certainly have. So when you go disappearing without warning for a few hours, what do you think I think has happened to you?”

Conner did look significantly more apologetic at that. “Yeah, sorry.” He turned back to Tim, “but I did have fun.” And he pressed a kiss to Tim’s cheek, causing Tim’s face to flush.

“Me too,” he admitted, and watched with amusement as Wally dragged Conner away.

The deity he expected to pop up the minute Conner was out of sight was not the one he got. “He’s cute,” Dick said as he appeared out of a flurry of leaves and petals.

“Were you watching the whole time?” Tim asked, dropping down onto the bench he and Conner had been on before he discovered the power of flight. Based on that becoming a hero to be a god again thing he’d been telling Tim about Tim had to guess that unlocking other powers Clark had meant he was getting closer.

“Not the _whole_ time, but that’s besides the point. The point is I haven’t seen you this into a boy since… well since. He seems to really like you too.”

“Don’t say that to me,” Tim groaned, sinking lower into the bench and burying his face in his hands.

“Come on, Timmy. I know the last guy hurt you a lot, but this one seems different and you should give it a chance.”

“Jason asked me to go on a date with him for information to kill him, Dick,” Tim mumbled into his hands.

There was a tense moment where Dick didn’t say anything. “He _what_?” And that didn’t sound very good for Jason.

Tim finally peeked out from behind his hands. “...I get the feeling you weren’t informed of this plan.”

“No. No I wasn’t. Listen here, Tim. You don’t worry about any plans Jason has for that cute boy, and you go date him. I’ll deal with Jason.”

Tim really didn’t want to be there for that argument, but Jason picked a very bad moment to appear in a burst of flame, looking surprised when he saw Dick.

A pleasant smile fell over Dick’s face, which anyone who knew Dick would also know it was a trap. “Jason. Honey. Darling. Sweetheart. What is this I hear about you wanting to kill Timmy’s cute boyfriend?”

“He’s not my boyfriend,” Tim said at the same time Jason said “Timmers doesn’t have a boyfriend.”

“He’s a nice boy who wants to date Tim and Tim likes him. You can’t kill him. Why do you even want to kill him?”

“Because Kon is the only person who can get in the way of my plans. Besides, Timberella here doesn’t like him. Kon just has a thing for him and I’m using that to my advantage.”

From what Tim could tell, Dick had never really approved of Jason’s plans to overthrow the other gods, but he never actively did anything to stop Jason. At least nothing in front of Tim. “Timmy likes him, Jay. I don’t care what it does to your plans. You can’t kill Timmy’s chance at love again.”

“I’m not- I’m not _in love_ ,” Tim sputtered indignantly.

“Yeah, see, the kid’s not in love!”

“Maybe not yet, but he definitely likes him enough that he will be one day, and you’re not going to take that away from him.”

“He’s eighteen. He’s practically a baby; he’ll get over it.”

“From what I remember, we also met when we were pretty young. Would you have gotten over it that quickly if I’d died back then? And here I thought you loved me more than that.” And that felt like a low blow.

“We were several centuries old! He hasn’t even been alive two decades!” Jason protested. “Don’t compare what we have to two humans having one date.”

“Human’s live such short lives; it’s comparatively the same. You can’t just take away Timmy’s happiness before he even gets a chance at it, and you definitely can’t force the burden of guilt over helping you kill this boy onto him. In this relationship we like Timmy.”

“I can’t sacrifice centuries of planning just because Tim has a crush either.”

“Then plan around this boy. We just said that humans have short lifespans.” Tim knew Dick really just wanted Jason to drop the whole idea of overthrowing Clark and Bruce, but he could only imagine how many arguments they’d been in over that.

“He’s literally the only thing that can stop me, according to the fates.”

“Well if killing this boy is so important to you then I guess that’s where all your energy and focus is going to be dedicated considering I’m going to be doing whatever I can to protect him. Come on, Tim.” Dick turned Tim around by the shoulders and pushed him away from Jason. “I’ll see you next winter, Jason. If next winter ever comes.”

“Wait wait, Dick, c’mon.” Jason reached out and grabbed Tim’s arm so Dick couldn’t cart him off, and by extension leave.

“Can I … go? I don’t want to be here for this,” Tim said, and got vehement “No”’s from both of them.

Dick let go of Tim to move between him and Jason. “Jay, I know you don’t like the others up there, and that you’re always going to want to bring them down a peg, but is it really worth making someone I know you consider a friend suffer?”

Jason frowned. “You wouldn’t like the answer I give you,” he told Dick. “But… fine. Maybe I can… get rid of his powers? Then he can’t interfere. Not like he wouldn’t die in a few decades anyway,” he muttered the last part.

“But maybe he can spend those few decades with Timmy. And if he does end up hurting Tim then none of us will stop you.” Dick pulled Jason in to press a kiss to his cheek.

“Congrats Tim. You just got demoted back down to bait since you had to go and catch feelings.”

“I told you I didn’t want to do this mission,” Tim reminded him.

“Well now you can go get yourself a boyfriend, Timmy. We both know how terrible they can be sometimes,” Dick gave Jason’s cheek a little pinch and got his hand swatted away for it, “but they’re worth it, trust me.”

“He can get himself a boyfriend after I’ve taken said boyfriend’s powers. And if he can talk his way out of having been planning to help me kill him.”

“I think maybe I can help with that last part,” Dick mused out loud.

“No offense, Dick, but you guys barely understand humans half the time. I don’t know if that’s a good idea.”

“Maybe, but I am good friends with Wally. I could put in a good word.”

“West already kind of hates me,” Tim admitted.

“Then all the more reason for me to talk to him.”

“After. You guys can work that out after I use Timbo to steal Kon’s powers,” Jason stressed.

“How about you do that later. Timmy really looks like he could use a break.” Dick took Jason’s hand and gave it a light squeeze, which really meant he was telling rather than suggesting.

“Tomorrow,” Jason said reluctantly.

Dick nodded approvingly. “See you around, Timmy. I’ll take this,” He held up Jason’s hand, “off your hands for now.”

* * *

“So this is the famous Superboy,” Jason mused, leaning against one of the training dummies.

“Yes… and uh, who are you?”

“You really aren’t brushed up on your deities for all of the power you got from Clark are you,” he muttered, looking vaguely annoyed. “Jason. God of death and the underworld. Nice to meet you. Let’s cut to the chase. I need you to take a break from playing superhero. Just for a day really, and then you can do whatever you want, but as it stands you’re in my way.”

“Why would I do that?” Especially when Conner being in his way implied he was up to no good.

“Ah, yes, I figured you’d want something in exchange.” Jason snapped his fingers and Tim appeared, bound and gagged in chains of smoke, somehow managing to look more annoyed and pissed off than fearful in very Tim fashion. “Will this suffice?”

Conner didn’t think he’d ever gotten mad that fast. “What are you doing? Let him go!”

“Happily. In exchange for your powers for twenty four hours,” Jason grinned at him.

“And what exactly is stopping me from just punching you hard enough until you let him go?”

“The arrogance on you is impressive. It always is on earth raised godlings though. Do you think that just because you’re half baked powers make you stronger than a human that you can fight a god?” The smirk on Jason’s face was both cruel and amused. “I welcome you to try, but I think you’ll find what you perceive to be powerful and what I do are different things.”

Conner jumped and flew himself at Jason as fast as he could, and went right through him landing on the ground a few feet away with a burning feeling all over his skin where he’d gone through Jason’s body.

“I am the ruler of the dead. I have been alive long enough to have fought your father and other beings just as powerful and survived. I have seen the earth before humans were a concept. And you think a punch will hurt me?” Jason laughed as the burning feeling increased.

Tim struggled against his bonds, glaring at Jason, shouts muffled. “Relax, loverboy. He’ll be fine. I’m not even really trying to hurt him,” Jason dismissed, waving a hand and causing Tim to vanish in a puff of smoke.

“What did you do to him? Bring him back! Let him go!” Conner ignored his own pain in favor of worrying about Tim.

“Again. Happy to. Once we have a deal. Timmy is perfectly fine, and I’ll deposit him right into your arms once you’ve signed the dotted line.”

Conner didn’t want to do it. Whatever Jason was planning couldn’t be good, but Tim. “You swear he’ll be safe?”

“Yes yes, Timberly will be safe. If any harm comes to him the deal is null and void. So, do we have an agreement?”

Conner could still feel the pain course through him. He could only imagine what he could put Tim through. “Alright. We have a deal.”

“Glad you see it my way, Kid.” Jason snapped his fingers again and this time Conner felt the power draining out of him. “Pleasure doing business with you.” And then he was gone and Tim was in his place.

“Jason! Jason, get back here, you coward!” Tim shouted.

Conner could only hold himself up long enough to fall into Tim. He’d never felt so weak before, but even then, “Are you okay?”

“He wasn’t supposed to hurt you,” Tim said quietly, hands moving over Conner like he was inspecting him for injuries.

Something was off with what Tim was saying. “Wha-what do you mean?”

“I-“ Tim bit his lower lip. “I had to help him get rid of your powers. He would have killed you if he couldn’t take them.”

“You-you were helping him? Then it was a trap? You were never in danger!” He was still weak, but he didn’t need strength to be angry.

Tim shook his head, dropping his hands away. “I didn’t want to be involved but...I sold my soul to Jason well before we met. I do like you though, Conner. That’s why I agreed to this plan, to keep you safe.” His eyes looked almost pleading as he tried to make Conner understand.

Conner felt a pang of sympathy, because despite everything, he still really liked Tim, but that didn’t make him any less angry. “What’s he planning?”

“...to overthrow Olympus.”

“What? Can he even do that? Sure he’s strong, but that’s a cloud of gods all at the same strength level.” With a grunt, forcing himself to use his own feet, he pushed himself forward, pulling Tim with him. “Come on, we have to tell Clark.”

“What? No, you’re weakened right now. You can’t get involved in this. He’s releasing the titans to do it,” Tim protested.

“It doesn’t matter; I have to do _something._ ”

“You wouldn’t even make it to Olympus in this state. At least send Wally to do that, he’d be much faster.”

Conner had to begrudgingly admit that Tim was right. It wasn’t exactly like he could fly to Olympus right now. “Alright, we’ll find Wally.”

The look Wally gave Tim when they explained was … not friendly. But he spared him the rant, simply taking off in the direction of the mountain just in time for Conner and Tim to feel the earth shaking under them.

“This is going to put people in danger.” And Conner was back on his feet, going towards the town.

“You’re going to be in danger. You’re barely standing,” Tim protested.

“Can’t just do nothing,” Conner gritted out.

“I’m not sure that you could do anything like this either.”

“Being a hero isn’t just about the powers. I can’t just stand by and watch people get hurt from this.”

“Then I’m coming to make sure you don’t get yourself killed.”

And so into town they went. The most they could really do was help people to safety as they watched the titans and the gods fight from a distance. The spotted Artemis at one point, doing the same thing, as she’d been in town when the commission had started, but they didn’t stick around to chat, they just continued to work on evacuation.

That is, until, “look out!” Tim shoved Conner out of the way just in time for him to avoid getting hit by a collapsing pillar.

“Tim!” Without thinking, Conner lifted the pillar off Tim and tossed it aside. “Oh my gods, Tim. What were you thinking?” He pulled Tim into his arms. He didn’t need to feel his injuries to know he wasn’t going to make it. No human could take a hit like that.

Tim coughed a few times, blood coming out when he did before he answered. “I wasn’t really thinking. If I was I’d have gotten us both out of the way,” he said weakly.

“You could’ve let me take it. I would’ve been fine.”

“Not without your powers.”

“But you definitely couldn’t have-“ he could see Tim slipping. “We’re fixing this; there has to be a way to save you.” He felt himself lifting off the ground with Tim in his arms before he really realized what he was doing.

“Save the others, Superboy. It looks like you’re getting your powers back,” he said softly, leaning his head on Conner’s chest when he couldn’t keep it up on his own anymore.

“I’m being selfish, I’m saving you first.” Conner had never been to Olympus before, but he didn’t exactly have the time to appreciate it, not that he could with all the rampant destruction around. This time when he aimed a punch at Jason, it landed given he had been preoccupied at the time. It didn’t seem to hurt him so much as surprise him, but it certainly got his attention.

“What are you- Tim? What happened?” He demanded.

“He’s dying is what’s happening. You said nothing would happen to him so fix this and save him.”

“Nothing was supposed to happen. What did you do?” He asked accusingly.

“He saved me from a falling pillar. Are you going to help him or not?”

Jason glanced at the battle waging behind him, but nodded anyway. “Dick wouldn’t talk to me for at least a millennia if he found out something happened to Tim.” He started leading them away from the battle, opening up a dark portal. “C’mon.”

Conner, for the most part, didn’t really want to trust Jason, but it was his only choice. He stepped through the portal and found himself in a dark cavernous area where he could see souls swirling around in some kind of water like substance.

“And now we wait.”

“Wait for what?”

“For Tim to die. I’m the god of death, not healing. I can’t do anything until he’s dead.”

Conner didn’t have enough time to point out everything wrong with what Jason said because as he opened his mouth he saw Tim’s soul fly out of his body and into the water like substance. He lunged forward, ready to dive in, but Jason’s arm blocked him.

“How very noble of you to attempt that without knowing what you’re doing, in fact noble enough to probably restore your god powers if the glow is anything to go by since you quite literally just nearly flung yourself into death to save someone. But I’ll handle this one,” he said, reaching his own hand in and plucking Tim’s soul out of the water, moving to put it on top of Tim’s body until they merged together and Tim sat up gasping to air.

“Tim!” Conner knelt down next to him, running his hands over his torso. “Are you okay? Is anything still broken?”

“What just- what just happened?” Tim asked, looking around.

“I unkilled you. I don’t do that often; it’s kind of the opposite of my job description, so don’t tell Dick it happened and we’ll call it even,” Jason answered.

Just from feeling Tim’s torso, he could tell that bringing Tim back to life also healed all his injuries. With that worry handled, Conner had to ask. “Who’s Dick?”

“I can’t believe you’re the son of a god. And you don’t know who anyone besides Clark is,” Tim said with a weak laugh.

“My husband. God of Spring. Tim’s number one fan,” Jason listed off. “The guy who is about to be eternally smug that all of my planning went to waste because you two couldn’t just stay put.”

“So… you just threw away all your plans… to not upset your husband? That’s kind of sweet.”

“Listen, that might not have worked anyway. The fates specifically told me that because of you it might not. Dick would quite certainly avoid me for centuries if I didn’t leave everything in the hands of the titans to handle Tim. And that is much worse than whatever reaction Clark and Bruce have to me trying to kill them again. And now next time I know to wait until there isn’t a godling brat to get in my way,” he muttered the last part to himself.

“Again, kind of sweet.” Conner could only hope that back on Olympus everything was resolving itself.

“Don’t call me that.” Jason waved a hand dismissively and another portal appeared. “Now get out. I’m sure Clark wants to talk to you now that you’ve achieved hero status or whatever hypocritical bullshit he gave you. And I don’t particularly want to deal with you right now after you just ruined a perfectly good overthrow attempt.”

Conner helped Tim up and led him through the portal. Just as it closed he could hear another voice behind Jason say “I, for the record, think it’s really sweet that I’m more important than centuries of planning.”

They found themselves on the top of Olympus in front of the golden gates. There was destruction all around, but the titans themselves seemed to be gone and the gods all appeared more or less fine.

Wally zipped over to them as soon as they made eye contact, checking Conner over for injuries. “You have your powers back. And you’re glowing. What did I miss?”

“I’ll fill you in,” Tim said, gently pulling Wally away when he noticed Clark watching them, giving Conner room to approach.

“Uh, hi dad.” It felt weird calling him dad when he already had someone he considered his dad back on the ground.

“Kon-El. I knew you had what it took to become a true hero. I knew you’d be able to rejoin us.”

“I’m glad one of us had faith. I had a few doubts here and there, but I had a good teacher.”

“You had the best teacher, and now you’re back where you belong.” Clark stepped aside, opening the gates to Olympus to him, and despite how much of it was in ruin, it still glowed in a way that he knew he would never see on earth.

Conner took a step forward, but something felt wrong and he knew what it was. He turned and saw Tim and Wally watching him with sad smiles.

“Unless you’ve found somewhere else you belong.” Clark didn’t sound mad. There was a tint of sadness in his voice, but it was mostly acceptance.

“I think I might’ve. I think… I think I want to stay on earth.” Conner looked to Clark, and Clark gave him an approving nod. As he stepped back down the cloud made stairs he could see the glow around him fade.

“Conner, what did you just do?” Tim was staring at him with wide eyes.

“I chose what was more important to me.” He took Tim’s hand in his and aimed a grateful smile towards Wally.

“You- you just gave up being a god! This is what you’ve been working towards!”

“Kid,” Wally put a hand on Tim’s shoulder. “He’s trying to be romantic. You’re kind of killing it.”

Tim’s cheeks flushed pink. “I’m trying to make sure this is what he actually wants.”

“You are,” Conner confirmed.

Tim’s blush darkened, but he still leaned forward and pulled Conner into a kiss.


End file.
